geography 12 · Section 3 · Part 2

Density of Density of Density of Density of Density of P P P P Popula opula opula opula opulation tion tion tion tion Density of population, is expressed as number of persons per unit area. It helps in getting a better understanding of the spatial distribution of population in relation to land. The density of population in India ( ) is persons per sq km. There has been a steady increase of more than persons per sq km over the last years as the density of population increased from persons/ sq km in to persons/sq km in . The data shown in Appendix (i) give an idea of spatial variation of population densities in the country which ranges from as low as persons per sq km in Arunachal Pradesh to , persons in the National Capital Territory of Delhi. Among the northern Indian States, Bihar ( ), West Bengal ( ) and and Uttar Pradesh ( ) have higher densities, while Kerala ( ) and Tamil Nadu ( ) have higher densities among the peninsular Indian states. States like Assam, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Jharkhand, Odisha have moderate densities. The hill states of the Himalayan region and North eastern states of India (excluding Assam) have relatively low densities while the Union Territories (excluding Andaman and Nicobar islands) have very high densities of population (Appendix–i). The density of population, as discussed in the earlier paragraph, is a crude measure of human and land relationship. To get a better insight into the human-land ratio in terms of pressure of population on total cultivable land, the physiological and the agricultural densities should be found out which are significant for a country like India having a large agricultural population. Reprint -